Page 1109 - bleak-house

disgrace to us. For he had a lion heart, had my George, al-
ways from a baby!’
The old lady’s hands stray about her as of yore, while she
recalls, all in a tremble, what a likely lad, what a fine lad,
what a gay good-humoured clever lad he was; how they all
took to him down at Chesney Wold; how Sir Leicester took
to him when he was a young gentleman; how the dogs took
to him; how even the people who had been angry with him
forgave him the moment he was gone, poor boy. And now to
see him after all, and in a prison too! And the broad stom-
acher heaves, and the quaint upright old-fashioned figure
bends under its load of affectionate distress.
Mrs. Bagnet, with the instinctive skill of a good warm
heart, leaves the old housekeeper to her emotions for a little
while—not without passing the back of her hand across her
own motherly eyes— and presently chirps up in her cheery
manner, ‘So I says to George when I goes to call him in to
tea (he pretended to be smoking his pipe outside), ‘What
ails you this afternoon, George, for gracious sake? I have
seen all sorts, and I have seen you pretty often in season
and out of season, abroad and at home, and I never see you
so melancholy penitent.’ ‘Why, Mrs. Bagnet,’ says George,
‘it’s because I AM melancholy and penitent both, this after-
noon, that you see me so.’ ‘What have you done, old fellow?’
I says. ‘Why, Mrs. Bagnet,’ says George, shaking his head,
‘what I have done has been done this many a long year, and
is best not tried to be undone now. If I ever get to heaven it
won’t be for being a good son to a widowed mother; I say no
more.’ Now, ma’am, when George says to me that it’s best

1109